Aidan Hutchinson called David Montgomery one of the most surprisingly good players he faced in 2022.
Sometimes the universe works in a beautiful way.
One of the biggest signings the Detroit Lions made in the opening week of free agency was former Chicago Bears running back David Montgomery. He replaces the well-loved Jamaal Williams, and while it will be understandably tough for some fans to move on from Williams, it’s easy to recognize the strength in Montgomery’s game that led Detroit to sign him.
And as fate would have it, one of the players that knows firsthand what Montgomery can bring to the field is Lions star rookie defender Aidan Hutchinson.
Let’s flashback to a month ago. It was Super Bowl week and Hutchinson was doing the media round, including [shameless plug] an interview with us at Pride of Detroit .
That week, Hutchinson also chatted with the fellas at ProFootballTalk, and that’s when Hutchinson brought up Montgomery in a more-than-flattering way. He was asked by co-host Chris Simms which skill position player surprised him with how good they were in 2022. Here is Hutchinson’s response.
“You know who is a sneaky one for me? I missed like two tackles on him in the Bears game was David Montgomery. He’s one of those guys—he’s so small. I go to wrap him up and he just kinda like—he’s so small. It’s like a little bowling ball. So I missed a couple tackles on him. So I’d say I gotta get back on him.”
That’s a pretty crazy coincidence. Unfortunately for Hutchinson, he’s not going to get much of a chance to get revenge on Montgomery now that he’ll be standing on the same sideline. Perhaps he’ll get a shot during a full-contact day of training camp.
You can watch the entire interview below. Hutchinson’s response starts around the 9:50 mark.
Shout out to Reddit user Kingkwon83 for finding the clip over on the Lions reddit page.